Absolut Art Award

June 2014

Jury Announced

September 2014

Nominations Announced

December 2014

Finalists announced

May 2015

Winners announced

Finalists Announced for the 2015 Absolut Art Award

Absolut is delighted to announce the finalists for the 2015 Absolut Art Award. Led by Jury President Massimiliano Gioni, Artistic Director at the New Museum in New York and at the Fondazione Nicola Trussardi in Milan, the 2015 Jury selected a shortlist of five artists and five art writers in the ‘Art Work’ and ‘Art Writing’ categories respectively.

Each of the finalists will prepare a proposal for a new art work, project or piece of art writing, unencumbered by commercial constraints, for deliberation by the highly distinguished international Jury. The winning artist and writer will be announced on 8 May during the Vernissage of La Biennale di Venezia - 56th International Art Exhibition, and an award ceremony will take place in September 2015 in Stockholm, Sweden.

Nominees Announced for the 2015 Absolut Art Award

Absolut is pleased to announce the nominees for the 2015 Absolut Art Award. Exceptionally diverse in terms of nationality, age and gender, the Nominators have selected a total of 47 artists and art writers, across both the ‘Art Work’ and ‘Art Writing’ categories.

Each member of the 2015 Jury invited two Nominators, with experience across multiple artistic disciplines and professional art backgrounds, to nominate five artists and one art writer, generating a maximum of 50 nominees for the ‘Art Work’ category and a maximum of ten nominees for the ‘Art Writing’ category.

The 2015 Nominators have selected 37 nominees in the ‘Art Work’ category, from across five continents and 24 countries, including established centres of contemporary art as well as emerging hubs such as Iran, Mexico and Ghana. Ranging in age from 30 to 69, the nominees in this category include widely recognised names, as well as more emerging artists.

In the ‘Art Writing’ category ten art writers have been selected, with an incredibly broad range of research backgrounds and theoretical interests. This element of the prize continues our longstanding support of the development of critical theory and nurturing artistic discourse.

The 2015 Jury will select a shortlist of five finalists, from both categories, which will be revealed during Art Basel Miami Beach 2014. The 2015 Jury is led by Jury President Massimiliano Gioni, Associate Director and Director of Exhibitions at the New Museum in New York and Artistic Director at the Fondazione Nicola Trussardi in Milan.

The winning artist and writer will be announced during the Vernissage of La Biennale di Venezia - 56th International Art Exhibition in May 2015, and an award ceremony will take place in September 2015 in Stockholm, Sweden.

The Absolut Art Award was instituted in 2009 to mark 30 years of creative collaborations with artists. The award offers an artist and an art writer a unique opportunity to realise their dream projects, demonstrating our continued commitment to collaborating on transformative projects with the world’s most creative talent. The winning artist will receive a cash prize of €20,000, complemented by a budget of €100,000 to produce and exhibit a new art work. The winning art writer will also be awarded a cash prize of €20,000, alongside a budget of €25,000 to be used towards the research and production of a new art publication.

In 2013 the Absolut Art Award for ‘Art Work’ was awarded to Renata Lucas and for the first time in the ‘Art Writing’ category to Coco Fusco. Lucas´ winning project, unveiled in September 2014, featured a series of site-specific architectural interventions and installations located throughout the Pier Mauá area of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Coco Fusco will publish her winning project in collaboration with Tate Publishing in autumn 2015. Previous Absolut Art Award winners have included Anri Sala (2011), Rirkrit Tiravanija (2010) and Keren Cytter (2009).

“We're incredibly excited by the breadth of nominees selected in both categories for the 2015 Absolut Art Award, and we look forward with great anticipation to Massimiliano Gioni and the 2015 Jury's selection of finalists later this year”, says Saskia Neuman, Global Art Manager, Absolut.

2015 Absolut Art Award Nominees

Art Work Category

John Akomfrah

b.1957

Ghana

José Antonio Suárez Londoño

b.1955

Columbia

Leonor Antunes

b.1972

Portugal

Nairy Baghramian

b.1971

Iran

Yto Barrada

b.1971

France

Yael Bartana

b.1970

Israel

Eric Baudelaire

b.1973

USA

Mariana Castillo Deball

b.1975

Mexico

Simon Denny

b.1982

New Zealand

Trisha Donnelly

b.1974

USA

Köken Ergun

b.1976

Turkey

Geoffrey Farmer

b.1967

Canada

Richard Hawkins

b.1961

USA

Camille Henrot

b.1978

France / USA

Federico Herrero

b.1978

Costa Rica

Karl Holmqvist

b.1964

Sweden

Iman Issa

b.1979

Egypt

Jesse Jones

b.1978

Ireland

Lee Kit

b.1978

Hong Kong

Ragnar Kjartansson

b.1976

Iceland

Mark Leckey

b.1964

UK

Minouk Lim

b.1968

Korea

Jean Luc Moulène

b.1955

France

Maha Maamoun

b.1972

Egypt

Rodney McMillian

b.1969

USA

Nicole Miller

b.1982

USA

Nástio Mosquito

b.1981

Angola

Shahryar Nashat

b.1975

Switzerland

Rivane Neuenschwander

b.1967

Brazil

Amalia Pica

b.1978

Argentina

Michael Portnoy

b.1971

USA

Laure Prouvost

b.1978

France

Frances Stark

b.1967

USA

Zhou Tao

b.1976

China

Kaari Upson

b.1972

USA

Andra Ursuta

b.1979

Romania

Arseniy Zhilyaev

b.1984

Russia

Art Writing Category

Julia Bryan-Wilson

USA

Santiago García Navarro

Argentina

Mark Godfrey

UK

Alex Kitnick

USA

Adam Kleinman

USA

Quinn Latimer

USA

Sarah Lehrer-Graiwer

USA

Helen Molesworth

USA

Dieter Roelstraete

Belgium

Tirdad Zolghadr

Iran/Switzerland/USA

Jury Announced for 2015 Absolut Art Award

Absolut is pleased to announce the Jury for the 2015 Absolut Art Award.

The Absolut Art Award offers an artist and an art writer a unique opportunity to realise a 'dream project', demonstrating our continued commitment to collaborating on transformative projects with the worlds’ most interesting creative talent.

Each member of the 2015 Jury will invite two nominators, who range across multiple artistic disciplines and professional art backgrounds, to nominate five artists and one art writer unrestricted by age or geography, generating a maximum of fifty nominees for the 'Art Work' category and a maximum of ten nominees for the 'Art Writing' category. The Jury will select one winner in each category from a final shortlist of five artists and five art writers.

The winning artist and writer will be announced during the Vernissage of the 56th Venice Biennale in May 2015, followed by an awards ceremony in September 2015 in Stockholm, Sweden.

The 2015 Absolut Art Award Jury

The Jury will be led by newly appointed Jury President Massimiliano Gioni, Associate Director and Director of Exhibitions at the New Museum In New York and Artistic Director at the Fondazione Nicola Trussardi in Milan.

The international Jury for the 2015 Absolut Art Award will include three additional distinguished curators: Magali Arriola, Curator at Fundación Jumex Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City; Doryun Chong, Chief Curator at M+, Hong Kong and Jessica Morgan, Daskalopoulos Curator, International Art at Tate Modern and Artistic Director of the 10th Gwangju Biennale, as well as Negar Azimi, writer and Senior Editor of Bidoun Magazine